


and they were dormmates (oh my god they were dormmates)

by glowingGalaxies



Category: Persona 3, Persona Series
Genre: Gen, and general confusion on ryoji's part thanks to his amnesia, and of course ryoji bonding with SEES because otherwise What's The Point, au where ryoji gets assigned to move into the iwatodai dorm and that's how SEES first meets him, mostly because I wanted to write some ryoji haha, though there's also confusion over ryoji remaining awake during the dark hour
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2020-08-20
Updated: 2020-08-20
Packaged: 2021-03-06 21:02:04
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 3,371
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/26015440
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/glowingGalaxies/pseuds/glowingGalaxies
Summary: Much like how Minato was assigned to the Iwatodai dorm as a placeholder until the school found him a spot in the official dorms, they now found a strange boy with very bright blue eyes and a long yellow scarf standing in their doorway.“Nice to meet you! I’m Ryoji Mochizuki, they told me I’d be staying here for a bit?”He strolls into the dorm as he says it, and they notice another strange thing about him; for someone moving in, he only had a backpack, no luggage they could see. Where were his clothes? He had to have something.“Is the rest of your stuff getting delivered later?” Junpei tries, though they’re all a bit on edge because no one really wants to clear out Shinji’s room. And because they technically don’t have an advisor managing the dorm anymore. And because the Dark Hour isn’t gone. Really, it’s several reasons.“The rest of my stuff?” Ryoji asks, smile faltering for a moment.“Uh, nevermind.”
Relationships: Mochizuki Ryoji & SEES
Comments: 4
Kudos: 43





	and they were dormmates (oh my god they were dormmates)

Mitsuru said she wasn’t sure how they had a new student transferring into their dorm this late in the year, especially when they didn’t… technically have a free room, according to the paperwork.

The general agreement was that the room was _not_ free; it was Shinji’s, he just wasn’t in it right now. Even if most of his stuff was packed up in boxes. He was just in the hospital. He wasn’t _going_ anywhere.

But all the same, much like how Minato was assigned to the Iwatodai dorm as a placeholder until the school found him a spot in the official dorms, they now found a strange boy with very bright blue eyes and a long yellow scarf standing in their doorway.

“Nice to meet you! I’m Ryoji Mochizuki, they told me I’d be staying here for a bit?”

He strolls into the dorm as he says it, and they notice another strange thing about him; for someone moving in, he only had a backpack, no luggage they could see. Where were his clothes? He had to have _something_.

“Is the rest of your stuff getting delivered later?” Junpei tries, though they’re all a bit on edge because no one really wants to clear out Shinji’s room. And because they technically don’t have an advisor managing the dorm anymore. And because the Dark Hour isn’t gone. Really, it’s several reasons.

“The rest of my stuff?” Ryoji asks, smile faltering for a moment.

“Uh, nevermind.”

They continue to stare awkwardly at him, and he goes over to the sign in counter and sits on it like he lives here.

Which, well, he _does_ now, apparently, but it’s still another odd thing to add to the list. Ryoji doesn’t seem to notice what he’s doing.

“We’re not exactly sure what the school told you, but we don’t have an empty room for you,” Mitsuru finally says, because someone has to say something. They don’t miss her careful sidestep of a lie.

“Oh, that’s weird, I guess that’s why I’m only here temporarily,” Ryoji replies, pairing it with a comment about how it’ll be a shame to leave now that he’s seen the girls here, and a wink.

The action clearly does not endear him to any of the girls; Yukari visibly glares, Mitsuru’s face grows cold, Fuuka looks like she wants to be somewhere else, and Aigis…

“This boy is dangerous. We cannot allow him to stay in our dorm.”

She steps in front of Minato for effect, though the girls seem to be considering agreeing with her.

Akihiko sighs. “We can’t just kick him out, the school’s making him stay here.”

Ryoji, for the first time, looks slightly concerned at the topic of discussion. “It’ll just be for a few days, probably.”

“We don’t even have a room for him, though,” Yukari responds, clearly to _Akihiko_ and not Ryoji, in a flat tone.

“I could, uh,” Ryoji glances around the common room. “I can sleep on the couch, if there really isn’t any space for me.”

Fuuka starts to look a little guilty. “We do technically have a bed that’s not in use right now. Since the person who usually sleeps in it is away. Maybe we could move it somewhere?”

Yukari shoots her a look, but Junpei slings an arm around her shoulder. “C’mon, Yuka-tan, you can’t seriously want to kick this guy out. He just got here!”

“We should kick him out,” Aigis immediately replies, and Minato rolls his eyes, stepping to the side so she’s no longer ‘guarding’ him.

“If it’s that big of a deal, and he promises to be quiet, we can move the bed into my room for tonight. As long as I get to sleep instead of staying up all night while you guys argue.”

“It _is_ getting pretty late.” Ken says, making a show of looking at the clock and reminding everyone why it’d be better to deal with Ryoji before midnight.

Mitsuru finally cracks. “Alright, we can move the bed into Arisato’s room for tonight, if that’s alright with you as well, Mochizuki.”

Ryoji nods, and he’s smiling again. “Sure! It’ll be like a sleepover.”

“It better not be,” Minato grumbles under his breath, as SEES moves to try to get the bed- or at least the mattress- out of Shinji’s room.

Everyone warms up to Ryoji a bit during the process of moving the mattress (except Aigis, who would probably have been able to do this by herself if she’d been willing to help at all), and Ryoji and Minato fall asleep before midnight, so no one’s around to see that he doesn’t transmogrify during the Dark Hour.

* * *

Ryoji travels to school with them, talking the entire time. He doesn’t exactly give up on flirting with the girls, either, but he quickly redirects his attention towards the girls at school who actually seem interested. He never leaves Minato’s side for long, though, which means Aigis spends as much time as possible occupying Minato’s _other_ side, and Minato spends the day regretting agreeing to share the room with him.

The next few days pass more or less the same; Ryoji and Junpei quickly start spending more time together, dragging Minato along into shenanigans that Aigis is mostly helpless to prevent. SEES gets a bit more used to him, and he gets invited along to group activities.

It’s only at the end of the school week that Ryoji and Minato both happen to be up past midnight, Ryoji having fully turned the evening into a “sleepover” conversation and Minato getting a strange sense of deja vu but really just wanting the “sleep” part.

The Dark Hour strikes, and Minato expects to finally get some quiet, only to find Ryoji completely unfazed, still going on and on about girls or scarves or whatever he cares about. Minato finally throws a pillow at him and pulls his headphones on.

In the morning when he gets a moment away from Ryoji, because he knows the dorm has surveillance in his room so they’d probably find out soon anyway (though it’s gone thankfully unused since their advisor tried to kill them), he mentions it to the rest of SEES.

 _That_ gets Mitsuru’s attention. He suspects that’s when the talk of kicking Ryoji out or having him transfer to the main dorms ends for good.

Unfortunately, that also means he can say goodbye to getting his room back to himself.

Minato feels like he should be more upset than he is; something about Ryoji talking to him feels less like it’s annoying and more like it’s filling the silence since Pharos vanished. That’s not to say he _likes_ it, because he definitely wishes Ryoji would shut up sooner, but he doesn’t mind it as much as he thought he would.

Aigis only grows more hostile towards Ryoji, in the meantime. When they have a dorm movie night (as an excuse for everyone to see Ryoji moving during the Dark Hour, to confirm it without the use of spy technology), she insists on sitting between Minato and Ryoji. He jokingly tries to push her out of the way a bit, but when she literally doesn’t budge and Minato doesn’t bother to do anything, he gives in.

SEES grows more antsy as the clock ticks closer to twelve, but finally the world is cast in green, and Ryoji… only seems to notice because the TV, in the middle of a Featherman episode, abruptly clicks off. Rather than attribute it to the strange shift around him, he first accuses someone of sitting on the remote, with a laugh.

When everyone around him remains serious, he goes quiet. “What’s going on?”

“Mochizuki, are you familiar with the Dark Hour?” Mitsuru says, her Dark Hour informational speech already on the tip of her tongue.

They’d talked about it; while they couldn’t be sure whether or not Ryoji had a Persona, he just moved here and already had the potential to experience the Dark Hour, meaning he could fall prey to the Shadows if he left the dorm. While they ultimately kept SEES a secret, Ryoji’s protection was more important.

“You know, it does sound sort of familiar,” Ryoji starts. “But I… feel like if I knew, I… forgot?”

That’s not quite the answer they’re expecting, and it’s enough to throw Mitsuru off her speech for a moment.

“You think he was involved in something with the Kirijo lab?” Junpei asks, as much to Mitsuru as anyone else.

Yukari elbows him, and Akihiko frowns. “You think it was some kind of test that resulted in amnesia?”

“That’s not completely impossible, but it does seem unlikely. I haven’t been able to go through all of the old records, but I haven’t heard of anything like that.”

“You think I’m some sort of test subject?” Ryoji sounds half-serious, like he’s expecting a ‘no’.

Akihiko frowns. “We’ve seen weirder.”

Mitsuru finally uses that to properly go into her Dark Hour lecture, which has Ryoji looking quietly contemplative in a way they haven’t seen him before.

“Something about that sounds like I… already knew that. I feel like you left something out, but I don’t even know what it is.”

SEES goes silent at that. If he _is_ a supposed ‘failed experiment’, it would explain the amnesia, and why he seemed to show up out of nowhere but already knowing about all this.

But they don’t say that. Ken explains how shadows come after people, and why they’re telling Ryoji all this in the first place, and Ryoji doesn’t lose that strange look but he does nod.

The Dark Hour ends for the evening, and Ryoji doesn’t keep Minato up with talking this time when they return to their rooms.

* * *

Ryoji mostly returns to normal after that.

He agrees to stay behind in the dorm rather than getting caught up with what ends up being Junpei’s temporary and Chidori’s more permanent death, but to his credit does what he can to try to help Junpei out afterwards. Junpei doesn’t really have the energy to say it right away, but he does appreciate it. 

Aigis goes unchanged, but at this point they’d stopped paying attention.

Their lives go on, except now Ryoji’s there. Despite reluctance from some, they do try bringing him to Tartarus, to give him a glimpse of what SEES does, and give him some context for the dangers of the Dark Hour.

Unlike usual, they bring the whole team with them into the tower, save for Fuuka and Aigis (who is guarding her, mostly to keep her from causing a conflict with Ryoji). Minato, Yukari, Akihiko, and Koromaru are on the front lines, while Junpei, Ken, and Mitsuru operate as Ryoji’s escorts. It’s a little strange, but it’s the easiest way to give a rather eager Ryoji the tour.

They stick to some of the floors around the middle; the shadows there are pushovers, so Ryoji’s not in any real danger with all of them around, but they’re not completely terrified of SEES already like the ones on the lowest levels are.

Everything goes exactly as expected until Minato tries to summon Thanatos.

It makes sense; the shadows are all weak to light, so Thanatos’ Mahamaon should cut right through them. What makes less sense is the fact that when Minato calls out the Persona’s name and fires his Evoker, there’s one thing that doesn’t happen- the Persona doesn’t appear.

What happens instead, though, immediately pulls everyone's attention. Ryoji, standing a reasonable distance away next to his escorts, raises his hand towards the shadows almost as if in a trance, and the familiar light of Mahamaon swirls underneath the shadows. It hits all three of them, obliterating them just as the spell always does.

Except it came from _Ryoji_.

He snaps out of whatever it was that just happened, and looks at his hand in surprise. The others run over to him, and there’s a lot of confusion and questions.

Even Minato looks surprised, which is a strange look on his face, but it’s quickly overshadowed by recognition. “You remind me of this kid that used to appear in my room every night. His name was Pharos, and he’s the reason I can summon Thanatos.”

The rest of SEES finds themselves with several new questions, and Mitsuru, Yukari, and Akihiko in particular aren’t sure how to tell him that when Ikutski was spying on him, they never once saw anyone enter his room.

Ryoji had that distant look on his face again, but his eyes widen as Minato says this. “Pharos…? That name feels… really familiar.”

Fuuka’s voice clips in through their thoughts. “Uh… I just got a really weird reading from Ryoji. He... used a spell, right?”

Akihiko responds after everyone stands around dumbfounded for a moment. “Yeah, Arisato summoned Thanatos and Ryoji used the spell instead.”

“I guess that uh, sort of explains the reading I’m getting? Ryoji’s not human, but he’s not a shadow either.”

“Are you saying Ryoji is Minato’s _Persona_?!” Yukari asks, whipping around to face Minato, who shrugs.

“He did seem pretty familiar to me.”

Junpei joins in. “But, hey, how could he be a Persona?? He’s a person! He goes to _school_!”

There’s more confusion, a bit frenzied now, and it takes SEES a bit to actually bring their attention back to Ryoji.

“This all just… Pharos, huh? I feel like that’s… my name, but I forgot it. I feel like I’ve forgotten a lot of things.”

“Uh, maybe we should finish this outside of Tartarus,” Ken says, shifting awkwardly. “I think the Dark Hour’s almost over.”

When they get back to the dorm, they check the video logs from around when Minato says he recalls seeing Pharos. They don’t see anyone in the room, but they do see Minato sitting on the edge of his bed, seemingly staring at nothing in front of him.

Mitsuru pauses the playback. “Arisato, it doesn’t appear the boy you’re describing… actually exists.”

That actually earns a faint frown from Minato. “But I had a Social Link with him. He’s the Death arcana, I wouldn’t have Thanatos without him.”

“I’m, ah, not sure… what a social link is?”

“Friendship. Sort of. Don’t worry about it.”

“... I do have questions, but I’ll worry about it later. You said the boy you were seeing looked similar to Mochizuki?”

“Yeah, like a younger version of him. Sounded the same too.”

Ryoji glances away. “The name Pharos does feel like… my name. Thanatos, too. I’m just not sure why.”

“Well, I don’t see what the big problem is,” Akihiko says, with a shrug. “We’re still trying to figure out the Dark Hour anyway. Maybe Mochizuki really is Arisato’s Persona, somehow. We can figure out the details along with everything else.”

Some of the others nod. 

“Minato’s weird enough anyway, what’s one more weird thing?” Junpei agrees, with a faint teasing grin.

“Do you think the reason ‘Pharos’ doesn’t show up on the recordings is _because_ he’s Minato’s Persona?” Fuuka suggests. “If they’re just in our heads when we haven’t summoned them…”

“Huh. Maybe.”

Yukari sighs. “If this is where we’re leaving the mystery now, can we all get some sleep? Tartarus was exhausting.”

Aigis glares after Ryoji as they all file out of the room after that; this time, though, she feels like she’s close to the answer of this puzzle.

* * *

Ryoji comes along with them to Tartarus after that; they’re not really sure what would happen if he’s not with them and Minato tries to use Thanatos for something. They try to tell Minato to use Thanatos as little as possible anyway, but Ryoji seems to want to keep doing it, to try to figure out what’s going on, so Thanatos ultimately stays in the rotation.

The next full moon catches up to them.

No one’s really sure what to expect, but Ryoji wandering out on his own isn’t it.

“Uh, dude, where are you going?” Junpei asks, as they catch up to him.

“The… bridge, I think? I just feel like I need to be there.”

Aigis trails behind, keeping a skeptical eye on Ryoji. She has her suspicions about who he is, now, as her own memories are coming back to her, and with what they recently discovered about his apparent connection to Minato. But the others keep trusting him instead of her own judgement, so she waits to see what he does on the bridge first.

She stays close to Minato, all the same.

When they arrive on the bridge, Ryoji has a look like he’s in a dream, like wherever he is at the moment isn’t quite real. It’s that distant look from before, amplified. His scarf blows in the wind.

Aigis takes her place properly in front of Minato. “You’re the shadow I fought here ten years ago,” she says, assuming battle mode.

“Am… I?” Ryoji responds, turning back around to face her. His eyes widen, a look of recognition eerily similar to Minato’s before.

“I fought Death on this bridge, but I was incapable of defeating it, so in order to prevent the coming of Nyx, I sealed it within Minato-san. You are Death, and that is why I need to protect him from you.”

Aigis moves to attack, a movement so routine that the rest of SEES immediately recognizes and moves to stop it, if only to give Ryoji a chance to respond.

“She’s right,” he finally says, in a quiet voice that’s lacking the usual emotion behind anything Ryoji says.

… Actually, talking like this, he sounds remarkably similar to Minato.

“I remember now. Finally.” He sort of laughs, but it sounds forced. “I’m sort of like Minato’s Persona, you weren’t entirely wrong. I _was_ stuck in his head for quite a while, and I _am_ Thanatos. And Pharos. But… I’m also a shadow, the Appriser, and as long as I’m here, Nyx will bring the Fall.”

“As long as you’re here…?”

“You’ll have to… kill me. It won’t stop her, but at least you’ll all lose your memories and live peacefully until then.”

“Uh, wait, what? Lose our _memories_?”

“It’s a difficult decision to come to, I understand. There’s still time until the Fall, I can leave and give you a month to think it over-”

“No.” Minato says, clearly, the first thing he’s said since this Dark Hour began. “You’re not leaving, and I refuse to kill you.”

Ryoji looks pained. “Please. It’s inevitable, and you’ll only suffer with the knowledge that it’s coming. At least take the time to consider this thoroughly.”

Minato doesn’t respond.

“You know what I truly am,” Ryoji says, shifting into Thanatos and earning a few gasps from the less prepared members of SEES. “Don’t make this choice on a whim. I’m not even human.”

Minato steps forward… and hugs Ryoji, even as he's in his Thanatos form. It's a bit strange because of that, but even stranger because _Ryoji_ is always the one dragging an unwilling _Minato_ into hugs. 

"I don't care," he replies, and despite having the same monotone it always does, the statement suddenly holds more weight than it ever has before.

The rest of SEES joins in on the hug after that.

"You're our friend, dude." Junpei's voice is a little muffled; a group hug with Thanatos doesn't quite work but they're doing it anyway.

"Yeah. You may be as bad as Junpei sometimes, but you're one of us."

"And we're not losing anyone else to this fight," Akihiko adds.

Mitsuru, in the loose outer layer of the hug, nods. "I refuse to give in and forget. You don't have to be alone."

"We'll find a way, we always do."

"We've come too far to just give up now."

Ryoji doesn't seem to know how to respond to this, though he's virtually unreadable as Thanatos anyway.

Aigis is the only one who doesn't join; she hasn't moved, still in battle mode, though now looking conflicted in a way she usually can't. 

Minato sort of vaguely turns his head in her direction. "Aigis, my arms can't keep doing this forever."

Koromaru nudges her heels with a bark.

"'People can change…'" She repeats, thinking. "You're correct, Koromaru-san."

Aigis joins the hug.

**Author's Note:**

> and then they all lived happily ever after as one big family, shinji gets better and returns from the hospital, and Nothing Bad Happens Ever


End file.
